Monrovia – The House of Representatives has passed the draft national budget for fiscal year 2018/2019 at US$570.148 million or its equivalence of L$84,333,327,390.40 billion.
Report by Gerald C. Koinyeneh, [email protected]
The document has been sent to the Senate for concurrence before it would be forwarded to the Executive Mansion for the President’s signature.
The House’s decision follows a report submitted to plenary by its Joint Committees on Ways, Means, Finance and Public Accounts craving the plenary to approve it.
The Joint Committee: “As per Plenary’s mandate, the Committees conducted a vigorous and thorough scrutiny of the draft national budget by ensuring a comprehensive and participatory review of both revenue and expenditure components of the draft budget. The review and scrutiny processes involved the Legislature, the Ministry of Finance, line ministries and agencies, civil society and members of the public.”
According to the Committees, it identified US$8 million additional and encumbered revenue from the US$562.148 million projected by the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning (MFDP), totaling a total revenue envelope of US$570,148,000.00 or its Liberian dollars equivalent of L$84,333,327,390.40 at an average exchange of L$147.9148 to US$1.
Speaking on the floor before the passage of the budget, the Chairperson of the House’s Committee on Ways, Means, Finance and Development Planning, Rep. Thomas P. Fallah (Mont. District #5) acknowledged that although there are enormous challenges grappling the country and its people, the passage of the budget will mark the beginning of positive changes.
“We know the demand and needs of our country and its people are enormous. The envelope is tight, but with an anticipation that our economy will have a sharp growth in terms of our revenue. Most of our basic social services, infrastructures, health, education and all sectors of our government can be impacted on a positive direction,” he stated.
The Montserrado County lawmaker noted that the passage of the budget within its constitutional time frame will be a historic moment for both the Executive and Legislative branches as there has always been delay in the passage of the draft budget in recent years; something he said can have an adverse effect on the government and its people.
What is in the budget?
The House of Representatives made slight changes to the version submitted by the Executive branch.
In the House’s version, out of the total US$570.148 million, recurrent expenditure amounts to US512 million or 89. 8 percent (MFDP version was US$488.7 or 87 percent); while Public Sector Investment Plan (PSIP) covers US$58.08 million or US$10.2 percent (MFDP version was US$73.4 million or 13 percent).
The recurrent expenditure is primarily used to fund government’s administrative and routine operational cost. It comprises of the following US$310.4m for compensation of employees, including provisions for new staffs from the security, health and education sectors; and US$91.1million for goods and services, including educational and essential health supplies.
Others within the recurrent budget include US$63.9 million in grants to government and non-governmental service delivery entities; US$30 million for debt service and US$0.048 million for social benefit and US$15.12 million for non-financial assets relevant to road maintenance and the acquisition of new assets for government’s operations.
Rep. Yekeh Kolubah’s abstention
Although the passage of the budget was a unanimous decision by the House of Representatives, Tuesday’s session was not void of controversy.
Following Rep. Fallah’s deliberations craving plenary to pass the budget, Rep. Acarous Gray (Mont. District #8) filed in a motion of approval that made it difficult to be challenged.
“Without much I do, I move if I can obtain a second that this budget be passed by this body and sent to the Liberia Senate for immediate concurrence. If there is any motion to reconsider such a decision, such motion should be tested on the bases of the absolute suspension of overrule,” he pleaded.
After Rep. Gray’s motion was sustained and House Speaker Dr. Bhofal Chambers called for a vote, FrontPage Africa observed that Rep. Yekeh Kolubah (Mont District #10) raised his hands to state his unreadiness to vote, but he was not allowed by the Speaker. The Speaker, who has the right to determine whom to speak in plenary, rather asked other lawmakers to express their un-readiness or dissenting views with their votes.
Rep. Kolubah then abstained from the voting process. He declined to state his reason behind his decision to a group of eager legislative reporters, who had surrounded him after session to ascertain why he abstained from the voting process.